Floor-mounted covers, are used, for example, at the upper or lower ends of an escalator or at both ends of a moving walkway, to flushly close off, relative to the surrounding flooring which may be walked on, the opening or entranceway of an under-floor space in which controls and mechanisms for the conveying equipment are located. Means are provided by which the opening can be exposed for access to the operating equipment therein.
The demands on such a floor cover are diverse in nature. The floor cover must, with a reserve of safety, withstand the static and dynamic loads during operation of the conveying equipment. It must be embedded into and lie flushly with the surrounding floor surface with the smallest joint, and it must be able to be removed safely and as easily as possible for the purpose of access to the operating equipment. Further, the floor cover should not, during stepping on and walking over, produce any mechanical noises due to poor seating and/or horizontal displacement of the cover elements.
EP 0 661 229 discloses an angle frame which is connected to constructional parts of conveying equipment for persons and which serves as a seat for a floor cover. The angle frame is adjustable vertically and horizontally by means of screws and nuts to provide a flush and joint-free transition to the surrounding flooring. For damping of footstep noises during walking on of the floor cover, the seating surface of the angle frame is covered by a resilient profile member, wherein the resilient profile member is positively mechanically connected at its underside with a horizontal limb of the angle frame.
Such a one-piece floor cover shown can, due to its size, be difficult to remove and reinsert. Further, one-piece floor covers are often very heavy and thus may exceed prescribed weight limits for manual handling.
The object of the present invention is to create a floor cover which does not exhibit the aforesaid disadvantages and which brings, with little effort, great advantages for simplified and safe handling and largely precludes faulty operation.
The invention is distinguished inter alia by the fact that the floor cover consists of several separable elements insulated in terms of sound relative to one another. The floor cover can be manipulated between the closed and open orientations. By use of a inserted resilient profile member as an intermediate layer between the separable elements, the creation of noises when the floor cover is walked on is avoided. The resilient profile member may be non-detachably mounted in a notch in a cover element, has approximately the shape of a Greek capital letter omega, and can damp vertical and horizontal shocks. It additionally serves as a seal against penetrating dirt.
A multi-part hinge may be fastened to a longitudinal side of a cover element between the cover element and a frame to permit the cover to pivot open. The hinge may include three shifting rotational axles, which enable the cover elements to be lifted up, laterally displaced, separated and turned.
The cover elements may be formed as extruded hollow profile members, wherein two or more interfitting profile members form a non-separable double or multiple profile member.
The underside of one of the cover elements may have a strut, by means of which the raised cover elements can be held in the raised position to simultaneously form a barrier for the opening exposed by the open cover elements.